


Blinding Taste, Colourful Sound

by Lafeae



Series: Whump/Hurt/Comfort challenge [20]
Category: Yu-Gi-Oh! Duel Monsters (Anime & Manga)
Genre: Aged-Up Character(s), Headaches & Migraines, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Pre-Relationship, Whump
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-07
Updated: 2021-03-07
Packaged: 2021-03-12 23:47:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,136
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29892384
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lafeae/pseuds/Lafeae
Summary: ...this was pitiful. He’d never seen Kaiba so stricken and distraught, like a vampire hiding from the sun. Moreover, he never looked so human. In pain. Fallible. In the stillness, he thought he heard a tiny whimper escape the executive.“You...need somethin’?” he said, lowering his voice.“Nothing you can do.”Joey lowered his gaze. “I can try.”—Joey stumbles upon Kaiba in the throes of a terrible migraine and decides to help out.
Relationships: Jounouchi Katsuya | Joey Wheeler/Kaiba Seto
Series: Whump/Hurt/Comfort challenge [20]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1246169
Comments: 12
Kudos: 40
Collections: Bad Things Happen Bingo





	Blinding Taste, Colourful Sound

**Author's Note:**

> Finally got back to my bingo board. Time to be evil again. 
> 
> Prompt for this one: Headaches/Migraines.

There wasn’t a more peaceful place in the world than the basement of KaibaCorp. HQ. Basement 2, to be precise. That was where the bulk of the top secret Research and Development work was done, so that was where all of Kaiba’s poindexters hung out. Which meant they liked it sterile and quiet. 

Joey could do without the sterile, but the quiet? It was beautiful. 

It made the 80’s rock blasting in his headphones all the better. He put on concerts for himself down there, grabbing the dry mop at any time to break out into a killer guitar-solo, at least until someone turned the corner. Then it was business as usual, sweeping, mopping, and generally keeping the labyrinth of hallways and laboratories clean and tidy. 

It wasn’t the best job in the world, but he was damn proud of himself for slipping into the KaibaCorp. employee pool without Kaiba’s permission. There was no way that Kaiba oversaw the janitorial staff. He had bigger fish to fry, and as far as Joey noticed in his seven months of employment, didn’t leave the upper floors very often. Which was perfect for Joey, because he only serviced the the two basements, the parking garage, the lobby, and the second floor. 

He met a lot of good people on those floors. The small folk. The secretaries and receptionists, the mechanics and maintenance guys, the parking lot attendants and, especially, all of the accounting ladies on the second floor. He started there in the morning for a cup of coffee and the occasional donut. They didn’t seem to mind him; he watered their desk plants. The maintenance guys and the occasional poindexter scientists had gotten to like him lately, too, and he liked to think that it was because he gave them a rock show every so often. Truth was, he just liked talking to people. Learning about them and their lives, being friendly. 

But he hadn’t spoken to anyone today. 

Accounting had their noses in their computers. The maintenance guys were chasing down call after call. The scientists had placed ‘Do Not Disturb’ signs on all of their doors. He took as long as he could to finish up the hallways, going so far s to wash the laboratory windows. 

Tentatively, he knocked on one of their doors. It opened after a second. 

“What?” a greasy scientist whispered. 

Joey pushed his cart of cleaning goods forward. “Need anythin’?” 

“No.” 

The door closed softly. As if the man was trying to make it as quiet as possible. 

Joey blinked and looked down at his cart and continued on. There were half a dozen labs in Basement 2, and on any normal day he would go door-to-door and quietly clean out the room. Each door he knocked on denied him, and one even reprimanded him for knocking too loudly. 

At the end of the snake-like hallway, he pressed his back to the wall. This was usually easy. Sweep, mop, clean the labs, move on to the parking garage. Not today. He had three hours unaccounted for and nothing to show for it. 

He pulled his headphones onto his shoulders and rubbed where the arm sat on the crown of his head. They were heavy today; he had no audience and his energy was low. Even though Basement 2 was sterile and quiet, it was never this sterile and quiet. It was downright boring. So boring, the fluorescent lights and the relative samey-ness of it all were just...depressing. 

His shoulders sagged. 

He closed his eyes and hummed, convinced he was still listening to Guns N’ Roses. He grabbed the badge hanging off his waist and strummed against the zipper of his jumpsuit. 

Why?

Why not? 

It made him happy. And if he was happy, that was all the mattered. Plus, he was getting paid on Kaiba’s dime to play air guitar in the basement of KaibaCorp R & D. How many people got to say that? 

Midway, a trio in labcoats came from one of the far labs, whispering amongst themselves and shaking their heads. He tried not to pay them mind, and stood back for them to pass. 

“...believe it, it’s never like this,” one said. 

“You know how Mr. Kaiba gets around the holidays. They drive him crazy,” said the second. 

“Shh, don’t be too loud,” the third reprimanded. 

“Oh, it’s not like he can hear us,” the second replied. 

They stopped in front of him, as if waiting for him to go by. The first one pointed back into the hallway. “Hey, can you fix the light back there in that back hall? It’s been flickering terribly all day,” the third man. 

Joey leaned over. He didn’t see any flickering light. “I mean, I can’t, but I can get maintenance.” 

“Whatever. Just fix it soon,” the first scientist replied. “And whatever you do, try and be quiet would you? No reason for anyone else to get yelled at.” 

They continued on towards the elevator, and Joey waited until they were go to head back towards the lab they’d exited it. He didn’t see why they were so worried about a light, but he’d call maintenance later. Really, this was an opportunity to get in the lab and clean it up. At least that way he could say he did something and move onto the parking garage. The attendant, Guillermo, owed him a duel anyways. 

As soon as he entered the lab, he noticed how low the overhead lights were. The flickering lights and screens flashed like a million stars in the night sky. 

More importantly, the metal table in the centre of the room had the newest duel disk design laying on it. By itself. No Kaiba or scientists lording over it. He beelined to it and leaned as far over the table as he could without disturbing the scientist’s equipment. 

It’s innards were exposed. The wires, microchips, and processors were out for all to see. Diagrams scattered the table, though he could hardly make out what they said. “I wonder what all this does here...” he said aloud. He didn’t care; how a duel disk worked, or even what was inside of it, wasn’t important to him. Just seeing it and knowing that there was enough for him to start imagining himself out on the field with it strapped on his arm.

And then a groan woke him out of his haze. 

He blinked and cased the room. When he’d come in, he thought no one was there, but he’d been sorely mistaken. 

In the corner of the room, huddled between what he thought was a toolbox and computer console, was a lump of a human being. They had their hands covering their eyes and their head tucked against the console. 

“Hey, you alright?” Joey asked, stepping close. 

The being lifted up and growled, “Shut up,” while never uncovering their eyes. 

They didn’t have to. Joey recognised Kaiba a mile away, even if he was dressed all in black and hiding in the shadows. He had a familiar outline, and it made Joey take a step back and reassess the situation. 

“I jus’ thought—,” 

“Turn your music off. It’s too fucking loud,” Kaiba snarled. He laid his head back down on the console. 

Fumbling, Joey pulled his phone out of the cart and hit the pause button. He hadn’t even remembered he had music on, nor did he think it was all that loud, but if Kaiba heard it all the way in the corner...

...this was pitiful. He’d never seen Kaiba so stricken and distraught, like a vampire hiding from the sun. Moreover, he never looked so human. In pain. Fallible. In the stillness, he thought he heard a tiny whimper escape the executive. 

“You...need somethin’?” he said, lowering his voice. 

“Nothing you can do.” 

Joey lowered his gaze. “I can try.” 

“If you’re capable of making the colours stop tasting so rancid, be my fucking guest, Wheeler.” 

Colours? Rancid? That took more than a second to process, and in the meanwhile, he took in all the computers screens and the blinking and blooping lights. Nothing was stationary, and when he looked back to Kaiba, his palms were pressing so hard into his temples, Joey thought his brains might start oozing out his ears. 

“Migraine?” he whispered. 

“How very fucking astute,” Kaiba said through clenched teeth. “Fuck off, Wheeler. I don’t even know why you’re here...” his voice trailed off, as if he didn’t have the energy to finish, but it was the pain that tore Joey in two. “You probably aren’t. I’m just hallucinating about you like always...” 

Joey pressed his lips together and got to work on...making the colours not taste bad. Whatever that meant. It was way above his pay grade. But he figured that meant all the lights in the room, which he started by turning the monitors off and wiping them down in the process. After, he went to one of the main consoles and took a second searching through the hundreds of switches and dials until he found the switchboard that he needed. He pushed half of them up and half of them down. 

“What are you doing?” Kaiba hissed, his face finally, barely, visible. 

“Fixing the bad taste, I think.” 

The blinking lights became solid. The harsher lights dimmed. 

Kaiba’s fingers parted and let a single blue eye rove around the room and drink it in. It focused on Joey right after, thinning. 

Before Kaiba could ask, Joey said: “One of the maintenance guys is epileptic. A lab guy showed him how to do this if he needed it, an’ then one day he showed me,” Joey whispered, shrugging. “It helpin’?” 

“Hn.” 

“Whatever works, I guess.” 

“Stop talking. Your voice is too....red.” 

Joey opened his mouth and closed it. This was weird. Tasting lights, hearing colours. That sounded more like Kaiba was having a drug trip gone bad, or maybe he was really was a crazy genius. That’s how it always felt in high school. 

And then there was the hallucinations? 

Again...? 

And Joey smiled. Well, if he was a hallucination, why not go with it? This was the closest he’d gotten to Kaiba in almost two years. The rest of the time had just been getting intimate to pictures of Kaiba in men’s magazines or fantasising about billboards. Kaiba hadn’t been the reason he’d gotten this job, no sir. That was only to support his dueling career. He wasn’t going to kowtow to Kaiba, neither, but he did need the cash, especially if a new duel disk was coming out. And as a hallucination, he decided, he could at least pretend to be close to Kaiba for a second. That’s about as good as it was going to get. 

“I can try an’ make it less red,” he murmured. 

“I doubt it.” 

“Well, whatcha want me to do?” 

“Do you have to ask?” Kaiba said. He sighed. “Massage my temples, like you always do.” 

Hesitantly, Joey approached Kaiba. He put his fingertips on the sides of Kaiba’s head, brushing the soft hairs out of the way. Before he started, Kaiba laid his hands overtop of Joey’s and pressed. Hard. And he began to knead it gently. Joey was more enamoured by the roughness of Kaiba’s palms and fingers. Calloused, worked hands. They were never like that in his imagination. 

They fell away. Joey kept kneading. 

“You act like this is first time you’ve done this,” Kaiba mentioned. 

“Why’s that?” 

“It’s different.” 

Joey bit the inside of his cheek. “How do I usually do it?”

“Little ovals. Counterclockwise.” 

Gently, Joey changed the direction and the shape of his motions. After so long, Kaiba let out a gentle noise. Not quite sighing, not quite groaning. Just a noise of reprieve. His shoulders slackened, and his hands dropped to his lap. 

“Good?” Joey asked softly. 

“Mm.” 

“Keep goin’?” 

“Naturally. You’ll go away when you go away. It’s how it is.” 

Joey held his breath until his chest tightened. This was strangely comfortable, intimate, and he didn’t want the moment to end. Part of him wondered if Kaiba knew it was really him, or if the pain was really that unbearable. He couldn’t decide which one he wanted more, but he did like playing the part of the hallucination. That way, he’d be right under Kaiba’s nose and, sometime in the future, be able to have another one of these moments. 

Carefully, he removed his hands from Kaiba’s temples and backed away. 

Kaiba’s shoulders squared. His eyes opened. 

“Feelin’ better?” Joey asked.

“Somewhat.” 

“Looks like my job’s done then.” He skipped over to the door, narrowly grabbing the cart on his way. Before he left, he asked, “Till next time?” 

Kaiba looked back at him and smiled. “Until next time.”

**Author's Note:**

> Just a short thing. Hopefully it was interesting, tried to run with it. Tell me what you think!


End file.
